


Nor The Bright Air My Soul

by ArvenaPeredhel



Category: Les Misérables - Victor Hugo, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Les Misérables Fusion, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Finno is Enjolras and Russo is R, M/M, Maitimo lives Maglor dies, Unresolved Sexual Tension, and this is extremely Brick-canon compliant, as we all have expected I guess, look I know we all WANT a Les Mis retelling with Russingon, you're never going to read that chapter of the Brick the same way again whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-18
Updated: 2020-03-18
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:40:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23201092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArvenaPeredhel/pseuds/ArvenaPeredhel
Summary: Maedhros cast the Silmaril into a fiery chasm. Maglor threw himself and his own gem into the Sea. Now, thousands of years later, it is 1832 of the Seventh Age and he has quite given up on ever being anything but alone. Unfortunately, a group of bright-eyed rebels and their strangely intriguing leader have drawn him in, and he finds himself caught up in yet another damn fool idealistic crusade.
Relationships: Fingon | Findekáno/Maedhros | Maitimo
Comments: 8
Kudos: 34





	Nor The Bright Air My Soul

**Author's Note:**

  * For [George_Athelstan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/George_Athelstan/gifts).



> I have taken some liberties with Enjolras and Grantaire's character descriptions - I'm fairly certain book!Enjolras is very pale as well as a natural blond, and my Finno is neither of those things, and of course Grantaire isn't missing a hand. However, this is meant to be a straightforward retelling of certain events from the Brick in all other areas; I've attempted to be canon-compliant everywhere else.

He is not really a member of les Amis de l'ABC, as much as he can appreciate a good pun.

He orbits their fringes, existing in the same spaces, claiming allegiance because he knows the right side of a war when he sees it but never truly aligning himself with their glorious cause. It is doomed to fail, and he can see it (he is very, _very_ good at finding lost causes, or having them find him, and he wonders if he is cursed) and yet he cannot bring himself to look away.

There are a handful of utterly brilliant _atani_ at the core of this endeavor - he watches them, and sees shades of heroes he has known echoed back at them. Men do not often recall who they used to be, but _these_ men, at _this_ moment, are closer than any he has seen in centuries. He fancies himself a true cynic, well-read and well-spoken and yet believing in nothing; unfortunately, his _fëa_ cannot help but be sparked to life by their enthusiasm. Their names come naturally now to his tongue, in this strange tangle of vowels that calls itself a language - Joly the imagined invalid, Bossuet the unsinkable optimist, Bahorel who knows everyone he sees on the street, Prouvaire who reminds him so much of long-dead friends that it makes his heart ache, Feuilly the workingman who seeks to uplift the world on his capable shoulders, and more besides. He is spellbound by their goals, their progress, their planning. They wish to overthrow their king, and craft new leadership for themselves, and as their king has proven to be a shameful disgrace to his title, he cannot fault them for their treasonous plotting. He has lived long enough to know that when a government ceases to care for all its citizens and treat them equally in the eyes of the crown, that crown deserves to be cast down and broken, or else passed to someone else.

It is the energy of these youths that has drawn him to the back room of the café where they meet, and given him something to watch while he drains bottle after bottle of cheap wine, and pushed him to sign his name to their membership. (When they asked him his name, he was quite drunk, and bitter; he laughed, and said 'grand R' in their awkward tongue, and has given only that letter ever since.) It is not for them that he stays.

There is an inner circle to this secret society, a trio of passionate thinkers who guide and guard the purpose of their little group. There are always three, be they brothers or cousins or gems. And as always, they could not be more different, and they could not be more alike. Courfeyrac is the warmest of them, the soul of the whole room. He is no fool, but his intellect comes second to his heart. He is eager, ever-smiling, flamboyant in his kindness and contagious in his hope. He is familiar - they are _all_ familiar - and his dark curls and soft smile are as daggers to the chest of his silent watcher. Combeferre is also kind, but he throws that kindness into study, and education, and the betterment of his intellect and the lives of those around him. He would make a fine king, in another Age, devoted to equality and to exploration of the unknown, but there is a recklessness in his determination that is haunting and echoes back to songs in the darkness and the grim jaws of wolves.

And then there is Enjolras, who he cannot look away from, who has consumed him utterly.

Enjolras, the chief of their group, standing head and shoulders above the rest, hair gleaming gold in the lamplight, eyes sharp and keen and focused.

Enjolras, who he cannot help but feel he has seen before, who makes him wish he did not have to hide his stature in a perpetual slump, or hide his missing right hand in an empty glove or the pocket of a coat.

It is this Man who draws him back, again and again, to the café, to the dreams of freedom, even though he is certain it is all doomed to fail. Avoiding Enjolras would be impossible, and purposefully leaving Paris with the aim of never seeing him again would be unthinkable. So he returns, day after day, to learn more of their plans, and to watch as an unlikely alliance comes into being. He is always and incurably _himself,_ however, unable to cease scrutinizing military strategy. He offers critique - sometimes kindly, sometimes less so. He pokes, and prods, and makes a nuisance of himself, and hides his growing terror under the comfort of the bottle. These children are all going to die. He can feel it in his bones. But nothing he does, nothing he says, will dissuade them from their goal. Especially not Enjolras, who clings to this impossible future as if it is a lifeline.

When at last he realizes _why_ he cannot turn away, it is very nearly too late.

The whole of their little group are assembled at a secret meeting in their customary back room, with Bahorel standing guard at the door. He is seated in his usual place, and drinking something called _absinthe_ rather than wine. It is nothing compared to what he knew in Ages past, but it is more reliable in its capacity for intoxication than anything else he has found in this city. The bottle is nearly empty, and he is only half-listening to the conversation twining about him, but he is watching Enjolras with his regular intensity. And he is rewarded for his efforts - the object of his fascination is eager, and animated, intoning instruction in a way that makes his brown eyes light up with something ancient and fervent, leaning over a map of the city and showing off elegantly toned shoulders and back and hips. His hair is braided in one long plait down his back, shimmering and shining and lending him yet more ancient grace. He is youthful in a way that sets him apart from the other _atani,_ at once burning white-hot and cold as ice -

\- Enjolras's head turns to look at him, and the light catches the gold braided through the hair that hangs about that shocking, impossible face, and suddenly, _suddenly,_ he finds he cannot breathe, cannot move.

All this time he had only ever seen the chief of les Amis de l'ABC in dim and sputtering lamplight, and it had been very, _very_ easy to assume that the gold in his hair was its natural shade. But now, it is gleaming, sparking off a halo of warm light, and he realizes it is fine passing thread made into impossibly tiny braids that are then braided together until the whole of the thing seems to be one color when in fact it is not.

 _Your eyes are brown,_ he thinks, his heart surging up within him, _and your skin is brown, a_ _nd your face is narrow and delicate, and your brows are dark, and -_

_\- and how did I not know you?!_

There are tears in his eyes, and he lifts his left hand to wipe them away. _How did I not know you, and how do I save you?_

“That arranges everything,” said Courfeyrac, and he starts upright, suddenly focused again. _What are you talking about now?_

“No," Enjolras - _Findekáno,_ and that name is water on parched desert - says.

“What else is there?”

“A very important thing.”

“What is that?” asks Courfeyrac. In the corner, he straightens up, wiping his scarred face with the empty sleeve of his coat.

“The Barrière du Maine,” replies his husband, and even thinking that word fills him with such light and life and desperate terror, and he watches as Findekáno pauses in thought, and launches into an overly complicated explanation of what is needed and desired, finishing with "I need someone for the Barrière du Maine. I have no one."

He cannot resist, even though he is drunk. Perhaps _especially_ because he is drunk. “What about me?" he asks, suddenly cocky and confident. "Here am I."

“You?” Findekáno asks, and Valar, he looks lovely in waistcoat and wide-sleeved shirt, and even his disdain is welcome.

“I.”

“You, indoctrinate republicans?" his husband asks, incredulous. "You, warm up hearts that have grown cold in the name of principle?”

“Why not?” he retorts, leaning on the table. This is flirting, now, and he is smiling.

“Are you good for anything?” Findekáno asks, rounding the table and crossing the room, and oh, he thinks he might die from the way those trousers fit his husband's hips and thighs, and it is a wonder he can keep his head. 

“I have a vague ambition in that direction,” he responds coolly.

“You do not believe in anything," Findekáno tells him disdainfully. _If only you knew,_ he thinks, and takes the bait.

“I believe in you.”

“Grantaire," his husband says, mispronouncing the _cilmessë_ he gave all those months ago, "will you do me a service?”

“Anything," he says, drinking in the sight of the other _nér_ hungrily. "I’ll black your boots.”

“Well, don’t meddle with our affairs," he is told. "Sleep yourself sober from your absinthe.”

“You are an ingrate, _Enjolras,”_ he retorts, leaning hard into the other of their pair of assumed names. 

“You, the man to go to the Barrière du Maine! You, capable of it!” Every eye in the room is on him now. He smirks, and shakes his head. _Time for some eloquence of my own, I think._

“I am capable of descending the Rue de Grès," he begins, turning the full weight of his attention onto his husband, letting his eyes burn molten silver for the first time in what feels like forever, "of crossing the Place Saint-Michel, of sloping through the Rue Monsieur-le-Prince, of taking the Rue de Vaugirard, of passing the Carmelites, of turning into the Rue d’Assas, of reaching the Rue du Cherche-Midi, of leaving behind me the Conseil de Guerre, of pacing the Rue des Vieilles-Tuileries, of striding across the boulevard, of following the Chaussée du Maine, of passing the barrier, and entering Richefeu’s." There is a grin firmly fixed on his scarred face. He is looking Findekáno right in the eyes, and he _knows_ his husband cannot be unmoved. "I am capable of that. My shoes are capable of that.”

“Do... do you know anything of those comrades who meet at Richefeu’s?” the other _nér_ asks him, but the blush is rising in his cheeks, and his mouth is half-open.

“Not much," he admits. "We only address each other as _thou_.”

“... what will you say to them?”

“I will speak to them of Robespierre, pardi!" he answers, forcing himself at the last second to keep the accent from his voice. "Of Danton. Of principles.”

“You?” Findekáno asks, and it is almost - _almost_ \- a realization.

“I," he says. "But I don’t receive justice. When I set about it, I am terrible." _If that does not tell you who I am, then -_

“Be serious,” says Findekáno, and he laughs aloud.

“I am wild,” he answers.

Findekáno stares at him for a long moment, confused and obviously more than a little aroused, and then nods, and there is something of bitterness in it.

“Grantaire," his husband says, and it still makes him laugh. "I consent to try you. Go to the Barrière du Maine."

He does not wait a moment longer, rising to his feet and almost running to his rooms, which were very near to the café. _If I am going to do this,_ he thinks, stripping out of his coat and shrugging off the slump that hides his stature, _I am going to do it properly._ Gone is the cap that hides his hair, the gloves to conceal one scarred hand and one missing one. In its place is his own shirt, and a scarlet waistcoat over it with gold buttons. It clashes with the copper curls that are close-cropped about his ears and keep their points as subtle as possible. He does not care. In five minutes he has dressed again, leaving dingy and drab castoffs behind, even changing out drab trousers for his own pair of well-tailored pants and gleaming black boots, and he returns to les Amis a changed _nér._

When he strides through the door to the back room a second time, he is drawn up to his full height, and he pauses to finish doing up the buttons of his waistcoat with his left hand. 

"Red," he says, nodding at the scarlet cloth, and then looking up again at his husband, who is frozen and spellbound. A genuine smile tugs at one corner of his mouth, and he crosses the room in a handful of long strides, and he leans down to murmur in Findekáno's ear.

"Be easy," he says, and he does not bother to hide the heat in his voice. He straightens up, and turns on his heel, and is gone in an instant.

* * *

Findekáno thinks the world might unravel beneath him. His knees buckle, and he almost slams into the floor, with only painful awareness of how watched they are stopping him. _Grantaire,_ he thinks, and a half-hysterical laugh nearly fights its way out of his ribs. _Grand R - and he only ever signed his name with R - and the cynicism, and the_ criticism, _and the bottomless bottles -_

"Enjolras?" Courfeyrac asks, when half a minute has passed and he finally shakes himself from stunned astonishment. He is moving, tearing across the room, out of it and out into the café proper, and then out into the street, clinging to the doorframe, wheeling in a wide half-circle. 

_"Russo!"_ he cries, frantically searching, but there is no one there, and he is alone again.

**Author's Note:**

> I might write more of this? I don't know. Probably. I'd like to do SOMETHING else. If people want more I will certainly give them more.


End file.
